University receives $1.6 million in ARC grants

The University of Adelaide has today been awarded $1,697,291 in linkage grants by the Australian Research Council (ARC) to assist in pest control, benefit the food and oil industries and increase understanding of migration to South Australia.

The ARC’s Linkage Program promotes national and international research partnerships between researchers and business, industry, community organisations and other publicly funded research agencies.

Improving the supply of ingredients for the gluten-free food industry will be the focus of one of the four projects to receive funding.

Professor Rachel Burton from the University of Adelaide’s School of Agriculture Food and Wine has received $486,000 to establish a breeding program for Plantago ovata in Australia to provide a reliable supply of high quality, superior psyllium – which is used as a dietary fibre supplement and is a key ingredient in the gluten-free food industry.

The project aims to attain better harvests, lower seed shattering and identify types of psyllium with new properties or whole seeds that can be ground into higher quality flour, and which may be superior for other baked gluten-free products.

“With increasing numbers of people avoiding gluten this project will benefit industry and growers in Australia as well as consumers. The fundamental knowledge gained from the genetic and biochemical anlayses of these lines will also broadly benefit seed biology research,” says Professor Burton.

Other successful projects to receive funding are:

$523,756 to Professor Pavel Bedrikovetski (Australian School of Petroleum, Engineering, Computer & Mathematical Sciences) for a project to develop a multiscale mathematical and laboratory modelling methodology for combined enhanced oil recovery and CO2 storage;

$492,000 to Professor Paul Thomas (Adelaide Medical School, Health and Medical Sciences) to develop an innovative application of cutting-edge genome editing approaches to develop gene driven technology in mice;

$195,535 to Dr Rosslyn Prosser (School of Humanities, Arts) to investigate the role gender and sexual diversity played in migration and mobility to South Australia from 1950-1999 and how stories of migration can be collected and preserved.

The University of Adelaide received more than 50 per cent of South Australia’s total funding in this round of grants awarded by the ARC.

Details of the ARC funding announcement can be found here.